Hacker News Reader

Comment by keiferski | Hacker News Reader

Yeah this is why I sometimes miss the jobs I had in my early 20s, working at bakeries/ice cream shops/etc. Obviously the pay wasn’t great and the working conditions subpar, but there is a genuine psychological benefit to making a simple thing, giving it to people, then finishing work at the end of the day and being done, without an ongoing to-do list, sprints, daily meetings, and all the other requirements of contemporary white collar jobs.

It’s led me to wonder how one could structure a knowledge work job in a similar way. The tough part conceptually is how to make progress long-term while still only keeping your focus on a day at a time, max.

View on HN

I’ve had a chance recently to moonlight doing the work I did the first half of my 20s almost a decade after I left it for tech. Despite its dead end nature, I’m seriously thinking about returning to it.

The work amounts to super overpaid (thanks unions) retail using antiquated software that it modernized could eliminate at least half the jobs, but since there are union staffing minimums and salaries the employer has no incentive.

There’s something nice about helping customers for a couple hours, doing some other mindless work which could be done in half the time if automated, and then going home.

And the group of folks in the industry are mostly great to be around. Particularly after nearly 5 years of working from home in roles that are increasingly more isolated and less collaborative.

I couldn't find it after searching, but I remember reading about a company where they just relaxed and got done what they got done. To me, this would be the ideal workplace.

With any form of investor expecting a return I dunno how possible this is, but I’ve worked for one family owned business (non-tech industry but had a small tech team) and it was super relaxed like you mention.

No investors, no board of directors, just a woman and her son who owned the business. They wanted to grow it but were very reasonable about it.

That being said the salary was probably 20-30% below market. At the time I wanted to make more money so I chased that for a while instead.

20-30% lower on a hourly basis or total compensation?

I often find that even investors can be reasonable.

Most of the problems in tech are of the employees own creation. Unreasonable requirements and unreasonable timelines, often coming out of thin air for no reason other than some middle manager's political interests.

It is super hard to fight against it, and it's even harder to demonstrate how forcing tech to work more than necessary is bad for business.

Small businesses deal with it by being small. Big companies are just chaotic complex systems where you don't have much of a choice.

I’ve heard similar stories, but I think they tend to have some runaway hit cash cow in their rearview enabling it.

Companies that can kind of do anything and it’s fine. Like Google with AdWords. Whatever they do, AdWords goes to work every day and pays the bills.

Other companies get high on their own supply and invent things like “Holocracy” and claim it is responsible for their success.

> finishing work at the end of the day and being done

You can try to find your own thing that you'll focus on after work. After 5 I would switch off any company equipment, phone etc. Make sure that there is never an expectation that you could be available outside of your work hours. Feel free to forget anything you worked on after 5, you'll catch up next morning. Some workplaces will be against that and make fuss. Find another job then and if it is not possible, just deliver as little as you can without being sacked. If manager is unhappy, but not unhappy enough to let you go, then you are doing great.

That's definitely possible, but in my experience it's not the same thing as actually being done when you're working at a bakery or wherever. Then you don't need to turn off your phone, avoid company messages, think about what project you have to do tomorrow. You don't need to care about the job at all until your next shift starts.

I work in IT and I don't need to think about that project that's running late or whatever. Yeah, I have to turn off my work laptop, but that's more akin to taking off my apron if I worked in a bakery.

Sure, it sometimes happens that I'm working on some interesting project, and I may find myself thinking about it after my workday is done. But it's because I generally love what I do. It wouldn't surprise me that, say, a pastry chef would possibly think about combining ingredients in some different way, too.

I think the only job where you absolutely wouldn't have to think about it is if you don't have any kind of agency and only do what you're told. I'm not sure that I would enjoy that kind of job.

Indeed. And I think this is both a case of managing expectations (if you're always available, people will learn to expect it) and also of realizing what is and isn't expected of you.

Where I work, a normal workday is 9 AM to 6 PM with an hour lunch. There's some flexibility as to the actual hours, I usually do 8-5, others do 10-7. Yet, some people always put in very long hours for some reason, complete with gulping down a sandwich in front of their computer for lunch. I'm not sure what gives them the impression they have to do it, since it's clearly not expected from our common higher-ups.

> Yet, some people always put in very long hours for some reason

Guilty. The reason was living with abusive partner and not being brave enough to end the relationship. Things were bad, but not bad enough to do something about it.

> some people always put in very long hours for some reason, complete with gulping down a sandwich in front of their computer for lunch. I'm not sure what gives them the impression they have to do it, since it's clearly not expected from our common higher-ups.

This is just how I like to work and approach problem solving. I can take breaks when I make the effort, but, when work starts, I rarely think about anything except climbing whatever mountain I find myself on, helping others at my company, or exceeding my own (or others') expectations. That intensity helps me think deeply and solve problems effectively.

There are people in my company who do good work but draw boundaries clearly and sharply. I respect that. I just love what I do and find it interesting and absorbing partly because I love the intensity of striving and struggling, constantly refining, improving, growing, and exploring.

My company generously rewards good work, too. That also helps; my effort never feels wasted, unacknowledged, or unrewarded.

I don't think you're talking about the same thing as GP. I've had spells like you describe, and I did enjoy them. And I don't know about you, but I never felt like this was expected of me by the company, so there was no pressure involved. I think that this actually being my choice made all the difference.

This seems quite distinct from what is discussed in this thread, which is people feeling some kind of pressure to work long hours, or to be available after work hours when they're supposed to be doing personal stuff. And, usually, the reasons for being called up don't seem to be some genuinely exciting problem that it feels invigorating to tackle. Instead, it's typically some form of TPS report that needs pushing around.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com